Black is black. But White is white. Will the two conflict or coincide?

This you unfailingly perceive at once when you look at Liongoren’s paintings—creations actually—but one in particular, TRIPTIC#1,(pun intended?), stands out as progenitor to the series. This is the first he’s introduced a third color in his black and white series,the subtle,gentle stroke of light beige. To accentuate, heighten,contrast the black against the white.

Here is the true artist: the serious child at play (Nietzsche).

Here Liongoren,the master juggler, tosses (at us) two balls in the air, catches them magisterially.
All this to delineate the two polarities of existence: Black standing for Nothing; White for Everything. Setting the equal balance, the equal harmony of the hidden mystery of all things. All this is the pure act of the invisibility of the artist. The mystery being in the visible. The artist is co-creator (“he breathes in maybe God”) with The Creator, creation being ongoing; creation,creativity are given controlled spectrum of Nature’s four forces, four elements: earth, water, fire, wind.

In short, the two polarities of life and existence,the equal balance  and harmony, of the ebb and flow of all things are being played in the pure.

Innocence of the artist: the mischievous but lyrical flourish of joy at the instance of being alive, an indelible salute to The Creator.

Liongoren wastes no stroke of his brush, sure his rendition of black and white, art’s chess game, harmonious, gentle,why,the music of the spheres intoned captured on canvass,the pure play of hide-and-seek, call it that, of Nothing and Everything, peaking in frequency, pitch’ vibration, all this transcendental acts.

Liongoren wields his right of conquering Black and White, neutral colors these,such difficult task, for in the final analysis, the contradistinction is to achieve victoriously the point of colorlessness.

He uses black and white to play out a human drama. White doesn’t exist without black. It’s his dynamic cosmology told on canvass.

Thus,out he is to uplift the viewer’s consciousness. For art to touch its audience,it must find its source in the higher consciousness of the artist himself (Nietzsche intones that one can only give out of bounty). There’s no faking it. This is how his art succeeds. He allows us glimpses of The Eternal, he’s been there. The spirit of the unseen, the invisible, is present. It’s the spirit of The Tao, The Godhead, is what holds together the center. It’s what Kidlat Tahimik calls “Dwende.” It’s what holds

Everything and Nothing together. Absent,there’s only empty space to face.

Everything can be honed; but only Grace comes fromGod (Nijinski). The matrix of art—painting,dance, poetry, music etc.—all this Liongoren delineates.Their Zen qualifications and outlook are suggested .

Their religious awe in the highest sense is present. Also the Latin “Voluptia”,plunging into life, holds a strong force that seduces, Says: “Be Here Now, Penetrate Illusions, See Beyond Maya’s Entrancement.”

Black: White: One Color but two sides of a Whole. To live life consciously, intelligently, calls for Wholeness. Liongoren paints austerely,nothing in excess. Art is vivid, living meditation with all senses open. Balance and harmony are Wholeness equipoised balancing duality.

Balance is power, center,peace. True art,a feminine creative force,has great healing power.Salute to Liongoren telling us all this.

He’s showing us “the richness of internal spiritual life and the banality of ordinary mundane conflicts.”

And, Yes, we have the native Filipino Mysticism inborn in us the legacy of, Yes, our ancient race.

Liongoren’s art indicates IT ALL: because it harks back to the first creation,the beginning of beginnings,his art bespeaks of the time when the first flowers, like the lotus, had no scent or fragrance, and darkness (black) was and then light (white) was.

Art revealing to us our spirituality. Art is contentious, indeed!